Messages - les protagonistes

To be sure, Marcuse worked with Freud's Eros only, disregarding Thanatos - as far as engaging in war and being aggressive "consciously," there's nothing strange or unusual about it (think soldiers in war) - what was being discussed here, I believe, was whether Thanatos is to be called an "instinct" or not ..

So if I get this right, this means killing others (murder) in order not to kill ourselves (suicide) in order to keep up with lack of life meaning and the conscious awareness of our deaths?

And that the deaths of the "other" serves to establish a symbolic immortality buffer for one of the parties? Kind of like the child that is forced to concede its physicality and "trade it in" for a symbolic sense of self (i.e., self-esteem)?

Quote

I researched a bit where does all this TMT thing comes from - it looks like from existential philosophers like Sartre, Camus and the like. Now, I have not read Sartre/Camus - I simply came upon a piece quoted by one of your fellow posters on this board. Take a look at it and draw your own judgment, as to whether such a piece deserves being printed (in book form) or not - maybe it's just me, but I find it very odd to read about a guy who "feels his mouth full of his tongue" - I am sure he's missing something - and truth-be-told, in the "hood" where I live, he'd get that right advice off-prompt, if yanno what I mean!

Quote

Existence is undoubtedly problematic and disturbing. In one weekend strip, in Sartre's "Peanuts," Schulz succinctly describes the horror of discovering one's own existence in the world:

Quote

Linus: I'm aware of my tongue ... It's an awful feeling! Every now and then I become aware that I have a tongue inside my mouth, and then it starts to feel lumped up ... I can't help it ... I can't put it out of my mind ... I keep thinking about where my tongue would be if I weren't thinking about it, and then I can feel it sort of pressing against my teeth ...

Sartre devoted an entire book to this experience – his 1938 novel "Nausea" in which his character Roquentin is alarmed to discover his own actuality. But Linus sums the point up very well in a few frames.

malachovsky, I understand your approach and sense of practicality you're bringing here - but if you stay alone and do not socialize with other people - as it is the case with lonely people like philosophers - it's not surprising that similar thoughts will come to your mind.

Now, it's never occurred to me, but I am sure it has to other people - Sartre, being on the record, on this kind of thing.

This sounds a lot like Derrida (deconstruction). The face and candle image each are mutually interdependent. Neither can exist without the other. And a Buddhist would say, "Both the faces and the candle are Empty of inherent existence!" Hinduism, also, thousands of years ago proclaimed that "Truth is One - but the sages call it by different names." Thus Hindus tolerate a great variety of forms of worship and ways of attaining enlightenment.

Derrida said, "What I understand under the name deconstruction, there is no end, no beginning, and no after." He also said, "Since it takes the singularity of every context into account, Deconstruction is different from one context to another." Now, if deconstruction is different in different fields, then how is it different in different cultures? If there is neither a beginning nor an end of deconstruction, and if deconstruction is different from one context to the next -- then deconstruction must also have taken place in other cultures -- long before Jacques Derrida was ever born!

To name just three: China, India and Japan. China's great deconstructive mind belonged to an unconventional, anti-traditional Taoist named Chuang Tzu. In a manner similar to that of Jacques Derrida, he played with words, in order to undermine opposites. Both are aware of the problems that language and signification create, and both use a playful, unconventional style of writing to undermine and subvert conventional meanings -- to create works that blur the boundaries between philosophy and literature.

[...]

There was a time in Indian history, however, when groups of yogis became skeptical of all this. From among all the phallogocentric seekers of truth and meaning along the great brown river -- the ever-rolling and tranquil Ganges -- from among the waves and waves of turbaned priests and Hari Babas, and Ramjab Babas and Omkara Babas reciting unceasingly the eternal names of God, there emerged sects of naked, long-haired or semi-nude wandering ascetics. And as they walked along the sands of the holy Ganges they carried tridents or spears in their right hands and their limp penises would sway to and fro. They began to question everything Hindu. In fact, sometimes they would eat the flesh of dead men or would meditate atop a corpse. And instead of chanting Om, and instead of seeking for Brahman -- the essence of everything -- they began to question if anything has an essence -- if Brahmin even exists. They questioned everything -- using riddles. And from among this group of skeptics emerged a young prince, Siddartha Gotama, who was to become known as the Buddha. The Hindus had believed that the soul or Atma was identical with Brahman or God, and that is was eternal. But Buddha taught that all things are impermanent and that there is no soul.

The Cup and/or the Faces?

Buddha paved the way for Asia's greatest Indian philosopher, who was to be called "The Second Buddha." His name was Nagarjuna, and many modern scholars have found that his philosophy has much in common with Derrida's "deconstruction." He wrote about Emptiness, saying that anything that is Empty is devoid of self-essence. Or in Sanskrit what is called svabhava. The cup seems to exist all by itself, and not to be dependent on, or related to, anything else. But is this a drawing of a cup or of two faces? Or is it a drawing of both, or of neither? Perhaps it is just a two-dimensional series of lines! The important point is that we cannot see both the cup and faces simultaneously. Each image appears to possess svabhava or self-essence. Each image appears to be a self-sufficient, self-existent, discrete image. But they don't possess self-essence! There is an intimate, subtle relationship between the faces and the cup. One cannot exist without the other. They depend on each other.

I appreciate the contribution made the poster, but now "by train" would really be appreciated if s/he would come back here to tell us what exactly stands this about - because we may speculate a lot of things, but I doubt it we can get to the bottom of this all, without any help... if you know, what I mean

To be sure, Marcuse worked with Freud's Eros only, disregarding Thanatos - as far as engaging in war and being aggressive "consciously," there's nothing strange or unusual about it (think soldiers in war) - what was being discussed here, I believe, was whether Thanatos is to be called an "instinct" or not ..

So if I get this right, this means killing others (murder) in order not to kill ourselves (suicide) in order to keep up with lack of life meaning and the conscious awareness of our deaths?

And that the deaths of the "other" serves to establish a symbolic immortality buffer for one of the parties? Kind of like the child that is forced to concede its physicality and "trade it in" for a symbolic sense of self (i.e., self-esteem)?

Quote

I researched a bit where does all this TMT thing comes from - it looks like from existential philosophers like Sartre, Camus and the like. Now, I have not read Sartre/Camus - I simply came upon a piece quoted by one of your fellow posters on this board. Take a look at it and draw your own judgment, as to whether such a piece deserves being printed (in book form) or not - maybe it's just me, but I find it very odd to read about a guy who "feels his mouth full of his tongue" - I am sure he's missing something - and truth-be-told, in the "hood" where I live, he'd get that right advice off-prompt, if yanno what I mean!

Quote

Existence is undoubtedly problematic and disturbing. In one weekend strip, in Sartre's "Peanuts," Schulz succinctly describes the horror of discovering one's own existence in the world:

Quote

Linus: I'm aware of my tongue ... It's an awful feeling! Every now and then I become aware that I have a tongue inside my mouth, and then it starts to feel lumped up ... I can't help it ... I can't put it out of my mind ... I keep thinking about where my tongue would be if I weren't thinking about it, and then I can feel it sort of pressing against my teeth ...

Sartre devoted an entire book to this experience – his 1938 novel "Nausea" in which his character Roquentin is alarmed to discover his own actuality. But Linus sums the point up very well in a few frames.

malachovsky, I understand your approach and sense of practicality you're bringing here - but if you stay alone and do not socialize with other people - as it is the case with lonely people like philosophers - it's not surprising that similar thoughts will come to your mind.

Now, it's never occurred to me, but I am sure it has to other people - Sartre, being on the record, on this kind of thing.

"Gaying" him just because he's stretching Ronaldo? I mean, that's part of the training thing they're supposed to do.. employing this kind of "logic" the guy sitting next to you whose leg accidently touches yours has to be gay!

Gimme a break, fellas!

Frank's - but, of course, we understand that - just because they're touching their legs that way, they're not gay.

That said, as an Italian woman, having been in the States for a while, I found Craig's arrest scandalous. Not that I feel sorry for Craig, who was a hypocrite having had voted consistently against gay people's rights. After all, Craig probably considered himself to be "straight," just having a quickie with a stranger miles and miles away from home, something that hardly made him gay.

What is appalling to me is the actual arrest procedure, the kind of thing that happens everyday to gay people in this country. According to the police report, the incident began with Craig's peering into the Karsia's stall several times through the crack in the door. Then, Craig entered the stall to the left of Karsia's and placed his roller bag against the front of the stall door. Once seated, Craig tapped his right foot - a signal, according to the police report, used by people wishing to engage in lewd conduct. After Karsia moved his own foot up and down (LOL!) - Craig, moved his right foot so that it touched the side of Karsia's left foot under the stall divider. Craig also swiped his left hand under the stall 3 times before Karsia held his badge down by the floor so Craig could see it.

Now, to me, this whole story is a nightmare of out-of-control police. Craig was simply the innocent victim of a banal set-up by the MN airport police - one that Joseph Stalin would have admired. There was no sex act of any kind. The idiotic cop - who appears to spend his entire work day sitting on a toilet in smelly airport bathrooms - walks him off, provokes him, and arrests him for lewd conduct. All this for tapping his foot in a public bathroom. This is insane!

In my country - as it is also the case in other European countries - sex sting operations utilizing undercover police officers are illegal. Such an operation would be considered entrapment by the police, enough reason to drop the case per se. (Funny how these officers actually believe they are not themselves gay - to them, spending a few minutes peeking at gay men hardly makes them gay - after all, they are there to bust gay guys, not have fun with them!).

The other thing that irks me is the way the GOP tossed Craig overboard as if he were a terrorist. Even if turned out that Craig was gay, so what?! There are a lots of fine gay public servants. His party should have been rallying in his defense, not make him walk the plank. In Europe printing in media the sex stories of politicians is frowned upon - let alone taking stories of this kind to court!

Are you kidding me, Italian woman? I've never been to the States, and I can not believe they'd do this kind of thing!

I chose to post here first as it appeared to me the thread/post demanded addressing more "urgently," so to speak - they (the State's Attorneys) go by the "intent" kind of thing when charging and convicting on these kind of things - an actual sexual act is not necessary - it's enough for the person charged to have had the intent" to engage in the offence cited for - the "intent" is the element of the crime deducted/inducted from the actual method used and the way the person reacted during the encounter.

That is how they do it in the U.S., at least. Tapping the foot and then touching on the part of the arrested of the side of the foot of the [arresting officer] in a gay context constitutes enough to make the actual arrest.